Field
The present disclosure relates to apparatus and method for generating inspection report(s).
Description of the Related Art
When making an inspection report for an object which is subjected to an inspection, it may need to be described in the diagnosis report the findings, measurement results, or diagnoses, for example, resulted from the inspection in detail. As an instance, when a user (such as, operator, doctor/physician, or the like) inputs via a computer system an inspection report (such as, diagnosis report) for an object (such as, an product, a patient, or the like) which is subjected to an inspection, for example, radiological inspection such as gamma-ray inspection, X-ray inspection, Computer Tomography (CT), and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), type-B ultrasonic Brightness mode, digital subtraction angiography (DSA), electrocardiography (ECG), and the like, he or she may need to describe in detail the findings or measurement results and even his/her diagnosis result in text in the inspection report.
Generally, from the inspection one or more desired images, or even video data, can be obtained. The user (for example, operator, physician) may make various marks, indications, or the like on the image which can be displayed on a screen, or perform various manual or automatic measuring on the features of the image(s). For example, the measurement results include geometrical attributes (e.g. length, angle, area, and volume dimensions) as well as attributes specific to medical knowledge (e.g. the Cardio Chest Ratio (CTR)). When the user describes the image findings in detail, the measurement results including values for each of the findings are required to be described. Traditionally, the measurement results are inputted manually by the physician.
There are some methods and apparatuses having been proposed for automatically generating inspection report(s). In U.S. Patent Application No. 2009/0106047 (Patent reference 1), a method for producing medical inspection report(s) is provided for avoiding manual input of inspection reports, wherein diagnosis data is captured for a selected display context, and then automatically converted into a report context.
However, due to the diversity and complexity of descriptions of physiopathology and diseases, such methods and apparatuses still cannot be widely used and many hospitals and clinicians still would favour manually inputting reports in textual form. The disclosure in the patent reference 1 cannot resolve the following problems occurring from manually inputting inspection report(s):                the user (for example, an operator, a doctor/physician, or the like) may need to write or input the textual description via a user interface (for example, on a display screen of a computer system) while finding, locating, and/or measuring specific findings on another user interface (for example, on another display screen) for displaying inspection images, and referencing the another display screen when writing the text report, which is not convenient and disadvantageous;        the user may possibly need to calculate the values and conceive appropriate phrases for description purpose; and        manually inputting may introduce mistakes.        
For at least partly addressing the above problems, the present embodiments are proposed.